The Manifesto Blogs – Part 2:Who Where is the invisible community?

In our last blog post about the new mission of Trans* Youth Channel we spoke a lot about the need to assist the “invisible” community that we define as largely the closeted, stealth, questioning, and under-resourced, but in using this term many individuals we surveyed refused to accept it.

It was vague and they felt they weren’t “invisible”. They were Trans*, or black, or young adults who were “disadvantaged”.

“Invisible” has become an emotive word equating to un-diagnosed oppressed minorities. It has become a knee-jerk call to action and an emotive appeal in marketing, advocacy, and more, but we at TYC feel, it’s become a place. It has become an environment where if a precious few conditions are met they will make anyone invisible regardless of their identity.

The conditions can build up at any time, they can develop in any way, across any minority or identity, but almost invariably, what makes someone “invisible” is when they are placed in a circumstance where one loses control over their own identity due to a build-up of hurdles, resulting in perceived or real anxieties, fears, and mental displacement forcing them to hide who they are.Need proof? Read on! If not, ﻿skip to the conclusion﻿.

One is invisible when they are not in control of how they identify

Consider an LGBT+ youth under the age of 16. They cannot work, they cannot live independently, they have to go to school in most cases, and their parents have legal control over their healthcare, most finances, and the roof over their heads. Now consider their family being un-accepting of their identity; devout and harsh Catholics who go to mass every single Sunday with a priest who has a subscription to focus on the family.

If that teen were to come out how much control do you think they would have over their situation? Consider 17 year old internet user: RavenRiver’s story in an article from About: relationships on coming out experiences:

“When I came out my parents made me go talk to their church bishop. I was told I’m broken, that they were taking me to counseling to help fix me, and that if things got worse they would have to take more drastic actions. They told me it’s just a phase and that I could be “fixed.”They also forbid me from telling anyone. To this day they cannot accept that I’m gay. It was horrible.”

Invisible community members in the LGBT+ community don’t normally express their identities “because they are not ready”, but because of some perceived or very real hurdle preventing them from coming out. Because resources to overcome those hurdles are not in their control, such as finances, independent healthcare, or legal sovereignty from parents, their ability to express their identity is not in their control so challenging the status-quot is extremely dangerous.

This is called an “external locus of control” and it means you perceive or literally do not have control over your life. It is harder to get out from under an oppressive situation, and that means “covering” your identity at work, at home, with family, online, and in various other living circumstances.

One is invisible when control of one’s situation is impeded by hurdles

By and large, the environments ability to control how you identify and when you “cover” your identity is composed of what we define as Hurdles; perceived or real elements of one’s life that impede the open expression of their identity. Hurdles are not always physical and are often subtle, but because of these hurdles one can be left powerless.

RavenRiver’s family had full control over her religious beliefs and freedoms as well as her mental health. They had that control because she was under the age of 18 and bound to her parent’s household. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing in most cases (we’re not condoning the removal of parental rights as a whole), but because she challenged the status-quot and came out, she wound up mentally and emotionally battered.

If you are a youth hurdles can be fairly obvious such as your financial, healthcare, legal, and school concerns, but hurdles can also impact you at any time in life. A prior volunteer of mine with Trans* Youth Channel for instance was a huge advocate for LGBT+ rights with her own YouTube channel, and she was our operations manager. After she had made the decision to go into college, because of where she lived, she had to return to the closet and stop expressing her identity outwardly and publicly. She went to college in Waco, Texas where it was (rightly) perceived as dangerous for her to be out as a Transgender woman.

Hurdles are not always applicable at all times. They can be present in some areas of life, but not in others. I personally spent much of my time in the first year of my transition from male to female, in a “part-time” transition stage where I was female in most of my life, save for times when I went to work. I worked at a high end luxury hotel in Cheyenne, Wyoming run by a Mormon family and it was legal to fire me for being transgender.

I was constantly worried about informing my manager or coming out while working there because I had utmost understanding that I would be fired. At the same time however they were not too fond of the eye liner that wouldn’t come off, or the long hair, or that sometimes I would come to work with nail polish on since I didn’t have time to remove it. It was suffocating for me, but the job maintained financial hurdles and job security over me. It had to do with whether I would find another job, or how people at work would treat me if I did or did not come out. These were not pressures I found outside of work and I was more than out around the town.

This same pain of being out – the discrimination, prejudice, and constant berating of your identity – can cause just as much pain and damage as not being visible. Hurdles cause very real fears of being stripped of basic life necessities before the age of 18, or losing control of your life without the resources you need all of which take precedence after coming out.

Often, until you have a plan to overcome every hurdle it is better for others not to know. For your own safety, it’s better that some not know. For my volunteer it was better that she not come out in college. For Leelah, not coming out could have maintained friends, technological access to an online “invisible” community, and ultimately keeping her life.

Perhaps the best depiction of the feelings, anxieties, depression, and worries that come from hurdles built out of the external locus of control, are shown in the video “Spectrum” by Boy In A Band. The pain of your family keeping you in the closet, not being able to love the person you love or are, but only having one thought at your disposal, “hang on, it will get better, wait until your independent.”

ConclusionThese three elements that create the prevalence of “invisible” communities in all minority groups are well understood in psychological, sociological, and anthropological communities, but the non-profit industry has not been able to permeate the barrier that the “closet door” has developed.

Because the invisible community is by definition incalculable, LGBT+ nonprofits have no idea how many closeted, stealth, questioning, or under-resourced individuals there are, and cannot afford to spend precious resources for the invisible community. Despite this one thing is very clear:

A large swath of LGBT+ individuals who are committing suicide, forced into conversion therapy, or are the victims of hate crime, are coming from the “invisible” communities and without reaching out to assist the community in breaking down barriers, helping them over hurdles, providing support to handle anxieties, and fostering an internal locus of control, the horrendous rates of suicide, hate crimes, and bad coming out stories willnot decrease.

The invisible community is held back by issues outside of their control and it is hurting everyone. They are being held back in many areas of their life and many of them will remain there for a very long time unless something is done. These people are largely those who remain closeted, those who have to return to the closet as stealth individuals, those who are still questioning their identities, but have no resources to understand themselves, and above all, those in dangerous and remote environments where an LGBT+ facility is too far away.